Results of Matt Shoemaker’s MRI returned clean, without showing acute elbow trauma, the Angels announced this week, but the right-hander is scheduled to undergo more tests next week, including an electromyography and nerve condition study Monday in Los Angeles. (Photo by Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images)

ANAHEIM — The potential length of Matt Shoemaker’s absence with a strained right forearm remains unclear.

Results of Shoemaker’s MRI returned clean, without showing acute elbow trauma, the club announced Thursday, but the right-hander is scheduled to undergo additional tests next week, including an electromyography and nerve condition study Monday in Los Angeles.

“The tests will help us narrow down if we think it’s this, or we think it’s this,” Shoemaker said Friday. “And we got to find a way to treat it.”

When asked if he thought the MRI represented good news or bad news, he wasn’t sure.

“I don’t know, because I think we’re trying to figure out what news is what,” said Shoemaker, who was placed on the 10-day disabled list earlier this week. “I think this test is going to help us narrow it down. It’s good the MRI has come back clean, that’s awesome.”

Before becoming the Angels’ second starter to begin this season on the disabled list, Shoemaker made his first regular-season start since June last Saturday at Oakland, where he allowed three runs and four hits in 5-2/3 innings. But toward the end of the start, Shoemaker described feeling pain in his arm.

Shoemaker missed the second half of last season after surgery to release the radial nerve in his right forearm, and he reiterated Friday his injured forearm felt similar.

He underwent the season-ending surgery last year following an EMG test.

“That’s what told us last year the way to fix this,” Shoemaker said. “I had something push down on my nerve previously. That’s why I required surgery to cut that off. Everything felt great. Now something is going on. It might be something similar, reoccurring. That’s what I’m trying to figure out.”

Shoemaker was 6-3 with a 4.52 ERA prior in 2017 before the setback. His previous season ended early as well because of a fractured skull when a 105 mph line drive off the bat of Seattle Mariners’ Kyle Seager hit the right side of his head.

Andrew Heaney, who was making a rehabilitation start for Class-A Inland Empire on Friday night, has also been on the disabled list with arm soreness.

Parker Bridwell started in place of Shoemaker on Friday night. Last season, the Angels’ pitching rotation, snake-bitten by injuries, was forced to use 13 starters.

Manager Mike Scioscia said Friday the club was awaiting additional information about Shoemaker’s health status and potential nerve issue.

In two games against the Cleveland Indians earlier this week, Ohtani had five hits in his nine at-bats, including a pair of home runs. He added a third – a 449-foot blast to center field – in his first at-bat Friday night.

The Japanese two-way standout, who will take the mound again Sunday, has been in the lineup as the designated hitter and batted eighth in all three games this week.

So, considering the early success, would the Angels move him up higher in the batting order?

Scioscia did not rule out the possibility noting “there’s always opportunities to adjust our lineup.”

“We’re still seven games into this,” Scioscia said, speaking with reporters in the dugout before Friday’s game against Oakland. “We’ll evaluate things as we start to get underway, but with the way he’s swinging the bat and where he’s hitting, that just shows we have a good plan and that’s what he’ll need.”

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Second baseman Ian Kinsler, on the 10-day disabled list with a groin injury, has resumed baseball activities, but Scioscia did not say if a rehab assignment was near. “He’s got some things to do before he’s ready for a rehab game, so we’re going to take everything one step at a time.”

Joey Kaufman is the USC beat writer for the Southern California News Group. Since joining the Orange County Register in 2015, he has also covered Major League Baseball and UCLA athletics. His work has been recognized by the Associated Press Sports Editors and Football Writers Association of America. Kaufman grew up in beautiful downtown Burbank.